White House announces 51 judicial picks, including two for liberal 9th Circuit
The White House on Tuesday announced the re-nomination of 51 federal judicial nominees left over from the previous Congress, kickstarting the administration's effort to install more conservative judges after GOP activists worried that such appointments had stalled.
Nine
of the 51 appointments are for spots on prestigious and influential
federal appellate benches, including two on the mostly liberal San
Francisco-based 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which President Trump has
often derided as "disgraceful" and politically biased.
Neomi Rao, the president's "regulatory czar," whoof the 51 appointments are for spots on prestigious and influential
federal appellate benches, including two on the mostly liberal San
Francisco-based 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which President Trump has
often derided as "disgraceful" and politically biased.
would take now-Supreme Court Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh's
vacated seat on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, is on the list. Case
Western University School of Law professor and Washington Post
commentator Jonathan H. Adler wrote
when Rao first joined the administration that "Trump's selection of Rao
suggests the administration is serious about regulatory reform, not
merely reducing high-profile regulatory burdens."
Also on the roll
was Brian Buescher, for a seat as United States district judge for the
District of Nebraska. In December, Sens. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., and
Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, raised concerns about the Omaha-based lawyer's membership
in the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic service organization --
prompting legal commentators to suggest the Democrats were engaging in
religious discrimination.
DEMS TURN HEADS WITH APPARENT OBJECTION TO JUDICIAL NOMINEE'S ROLE IN CATHOLIC ORGANIZATION
“The
Knights of Columbus has taken a number of extreme positions,” Hirono
said in a questionnaire sent to Buescher. “For example, it was
reportedly one of the top contributors to California’s Proposition 8
campaign to ban same-sex marriage.”
in her questions to the nominee, called the Knights of Columbus “an
all-male society” and asked the Nebraska lawyer if he was aware that the
group was anti-abortion and opposed to same-sex marriage when he
joined.
The California senator and 2020 presidential hopeful also
referenced Supreme Knight Carl A. Anderson’s statement that abortion
amounted to “the killing of the innocent on a massive scale” and asked
Buescher if he agreed with the statement.
In his response,
Buescher argued that the Knights of Columbus’ official positions on
issues do not represent every one of the group’s members and said he
would recuse himself from hearing cases where he saw a conflict of
interest.
“The Knights of Columbus does not have the authority to
take personal political positions on behalf of all of its approximately
two million members,” Buescher wrote. “If confirmed, I will apply all
provisions of the Code of Conduct for United States Judges regarding
recusal and disqualification.”
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco has long drawn
the ire of President Trump, who has called it "disgraceful." (AP)
the ire of President Trump, who has called it "disgraceful." (AP)
entitled "Anti-Catholic bigotry is alive in the U.S. Senate,"
columnist Michael Gerson wrote that questions like the ones from Harris
and Hirono were inappropriate and "scare the hell out of vast sections
of the country."
Missing from the list of
re-nominated judges, for now, were three conservatives the White House
has said it will install on the Ninth Circuit without first seeking
what's known as a "blue slip," or an opinion, from California
senators Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Harris.
The White House
announced in October Trump had nominated Patrick Bumatay, Daniel Collins
and Kenneth Kiyul Lee (all from the Golden State, and reportedly all
members of the conservative Federalist Society) to the 9th Circuit,
bypassing the traditional blue slip process in an apparent snub of
Feinstein and Harris.
The liberal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals,
with a sprawling purview representing nine Western states, has long been
a thorn in the side of the Trump White House, with rulings against the
travel ban and limits on funding to "sanctuary cities."
TRUMP SLAMS 'DISGRACEFUL' NINTH CIRCUIT, SUGGESTS THEY WOULD OVERTURN HIS TURKEY PARDON IF THEY COULD
The
Judicial Crisis Network announced in a statement it would launch a $1.5
million national advertising campaign on both television and the
Internet calling on Democrats to support the 51 judges, and noting that
there are an "unprecedented 163 judicial vacancies in the federal court
system."
“Because
of Democrats’ unprecedented obstruction of judicial nominees, we now
have significantly more vacancies than when President Trump took
office," Judicial Crisis Network Chief Counsel and Policy Director
Carrie Severino said in a statement.
"Senator McConnell has
restated his commitment to filling the vacancies and has maintained that
this is a Senate priority. It’s time for Democrats to end the bullying
and smear campaigns and confirm the judges," Severino added.
The
nominations seemed poised to quiet growing conservative unrest about the
relative lack of news on appointments during the ongoing partial
federal government shutdown, which commenced Dec. 22. Six new
appointments to federal district courts, which are effectively trial
courts, were announced by the White House last week.
“People are
starting to scratch their heads and wonder, ‘When are we going to start
up again?" one source close to the White House told Politico earlier
this month.
The White House, along with Senate GOP leaders,
has made appointing conservative judges and justices a key priority.
Under the Trump administration, 85 federal judges have been installed,
including Associate Supreme Court Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett
Kavanaugh, and 30 appellate judges.
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
Senate
Democrats previously eliminated the filibuster for federal judicial
nominees below the Supreme Court level during the Obama administration,
meaning that each of the 51 nominees needs only a majority vote in the
Senate to win confirmation.
Once they claimed their current Senate
majority, Republicans, in response, eliminated the filibuster for
Supreme Court nominees as well.
Fox News' Judd Berger and Andrew O'Reilly contributed to this report.
